🚚 Supply Chain & Distribution Logistics for Beekeeping Businesses

About this simulation

A growing beekeeping business runs two intertwined logistics chains at once: an inbound supply chain bringing equipment, woodware, jars and consumables in from a manufacturer or wholesaler, and an outbound distribution chain moving hives, colonies and finished products (honey, wax, nucs) out to apiary sites and to market. This map shows both running simultaneously around a regional depot.

How it works

• Supplier → Depot — bulk deliveries of frames, foundation, jars and protective gear restock the depot's inventory (the glowing bar).
• Depot → Apiary sites — trucks carry equipment and, in migratory mode, whole hive pallets out to bloom locations, returning with honey and wax.
• Depot → Market — finished product runs deliver packaged honey to retail and wholesale buyers.
• Depot stock drains continuously with demand and jumps back up whenever a supplier truck completes its run — mirroring real reorder-point inventory management.

Controls

• Fleet size — total number of trucks shared across every active route.
• Truck speed — how fast vehicles move along the road network.
• Demand / restock rate — how quickly depot stock is consumed by outbound loads.
• Routing mode — Local keeps trucks near the depot; Migratory adds distant seasonal apiary sites, the way beekeepers move hives to follow blooms.
• Show cargo labels — toggles small colour-coded cargo boxes on each truck bed.

Did you know?

Commercial migratory beekeepers can move hundreds of hives thousands of miles a year, timing truck moves to overnight temperature drops so bees stay calmer and hive entrances can be safely closed for the road.